She was near tears, very near them, had lifted a hand to his chest, not to push him away, but to try to soothe. With a great feral howl, the wolf leaped through the open window. Fangs gleamed white in the lamplight as he sprang, a vicious snarl erupting from his throat.

His powerful forelegs caught Alan just below the shoulders, knocked him back. A table snapped as the combined weight crashed into it. And before Rowan could draw breath, Alan was lying white-faced on the floor with the black wolf snapping at his throat.

“No, no!” Terror gave her both speed and strength. She jumped to them, dived down to wrap her arms around the wolf’s neck. “Don’t, don’t hurt him. He wasn’t hurting me.”

She could feel the muscles vibrating beneath her, hear the growls rumble like threatening thunder. The horrible image of ripped flesh, pumping blood, screams raced through her head. Without a thought she shifted, pushed her face between them and looked into the wolf’s glowing eyes.

There she saw savagery.

“He wasn’t hurting me,” she said calmly. “He’s a friend. He’s upset, but he’d never hurt me. Let him up now, please.”

The wolf snarled again, and something flashed in his eyes that was almost … human, she thought. She could smell the wildness around him, in him. Very gently she laid her cheek against his. “It’s all right now.” Her lips grazed his fur. “Everything’s all right.”

Slowly he moved back. But his body shoved against hers until he stood between her and Alan. As a precaution, she kept a hand on the ruff of his neck as she got to her feet.

“I’m sorry, Alan. Are you hurt?”

“Name of God, name of God.” It was all he could manage in a voice that shook. Sheer terror had his muscles weak as water. Each breath burned his lungs, and his chest was bruised where the beast had attacked him. “Get away from it, Rowan. Get back.” Though he trembled all over from shock, he crawled to his feet, grabbed a lamp. “Get away, get upstairs.”

“Don’t you dare hit him.” Indignant, she snatched the lamp out of Alan’s unsteady hands. “He was only protecting me. He thought you were hurting me.”

“Protecting you? For the love of God, Rowan, that’s a wolf.”

She jerked back when he tried to grab her, then followed instinct and told perhaps the first outright lie of her life. “Of course it’s not. Don’t be absurd. It’s a dog.” She thought she felt the wolf jolt under her hand at the claim. Out of the corner of her eye she saw him angle his head up and … well, glare at her. “My dog,” she insisted. “And he did precisely what you would expect from a well-trained dog. He protected me against what he saw as a threat.”